Master Humphrey's Clock - Charles Dickens (online e reader .TXT) 📗

who were of a theological turn, propounded to him the question, whether such a character was not but poorly armed for single combat with the Devil, and whether he himself would not have been a stronger opponent; but the clerical gentleman, sharply reproving them for their presumption in discussing such questions, clearly showed that a fitter champion than Will could scarcely have been selected, not only for that being a child of Satan, he was the less likely to be alarmed by the appearance of his own father, but because Satan himself would be at his ease in such company, and would not scruple to kick up his heels to an extent which it was quite certain he would never venture before clerical eyes, under whose influence (as was notorious) he became quite a tame and milk-and-water character.

But when next morning arrived, and with it no Will Marks, and when a strong party repairing to the spot, as a strong party ventured to do in broad day, found Will gone and the gibbet empty, matters grew serious indeed. The day passing away and no news arriving, and the night going on also without any intelligence, the thing grew more tremendous still; in short, the neighbourhood worked itself up to such a comfortable pitch of mystery and horror, that it is a great question whether the general feeling was not one of excessive disappointment, when, on the second morning, Will Marks returned.

However this may be, back Will came in a very cool and collected state, and appearing not to trouble himself much about anybody except old John Podgers, who, having been sent for, was sitting in the Town Hall crying slowly, and dozing between whiles. Having embraced his uncle and assured him of his safety, Will mounted on a table and told his story to the crowd.

And surely they would have been the most unreasonable crowd that ever assembled together, if they had been in the least respect disappointed with the tale he told them; for besides describing the Witches’ Dance to the minutest motion of their legs, and performing it in character on the table, with the assistance of a broomstick, he related how they had carried off the body in a copper caldron, and so bewitched him, that he lost his senses until he found himself lying under a hedge at least ten miles off, whence he had straightway returned as they then beheld. The story gained such universal applause that it soon afterwards brought down express from London the great witch-finder of the age, the Heaven-born Hopkins, who having examined Will closely on several points, pronounced it the most extraordinary and the best accredited witch-story ever known, under which title it was published at the Three Bibles on London Bridge, in small quarto, with a view of the caldron from an original drawing, and a portrait of the clerical gentleman as he sat by the fire.

On one point Will was particularly careful: and that was to describe for the witches he had seen, three impossible old females, whose likenesses never were or will be. Thus he saved the lives of the suspected parties, and of all other old women who were dragged before him to be identified.

This circumstance occasioned John Podgers much grief and sorrow, until happening one day to cast his eyes upon his housekeeper, and observing her to be plainly afflicted with rheumatism, he procured her to be burnt as an undoubted witch. For this service to the state he was immediately knighted, and became from that time Sir John Podgers.

Will Marks never gained any clue to the mystery in which he had been an actor, nor did any inscription in the church, which he often visited afterwards, nor any of the limited inquiries that he dared to make, yield him the least assistance. As he kept his own secret, he was compelled to spend the gold discreetly and sparingly. In the course of time he married the young lady of whom I have already told you, whose maiden name is not recorded, with whom he led a prosperous and happy life. Years and years after this adventure, it was his wont to tell her upon a stormy night that it was a great comfort to him to think those bones, to whomsoever they might have once belonged, were not bleaching in the troubled air, but were mouldering away with the dust of their own kith and kindred in a quiet grave.

 

FURTHER PARTICULARS OF MASTER HUMPHREY’S VISITOR

 

Being very full of Mr. Pickwick’s application, and highly pleased with the compliment he had paid me, it will be readily supposed that long before our next night of meeting I communicated it to my three friends, who unanimously voted his admission into our body. We all looked forward with some impatience to the occasion which would enroll him among us, but I am greatly mistaken if Jack Redburn and myself were not by many degrees the most impatient of the party.

At length the night came, and a few minutes after ten Mr. Pickwick’s knock was heard at the street-door. He was shown into a lower room, and I directly took my crooked stick and went to accompany him up-stairs, in order that he might be presented with all honour and formality.

‘Mr. Pickwick,’ said I, on entering the room, ‘I am rejoiced to see you, - rejoiced to believe that this is but the opening of a long series of visits to this house, and but the beginning of a close and lasting friendship.’

That gentleman made a suitable reply with a cordiality and frankness peculiarly his own, and glanced with a smile towards two persons behind the door, whom I had not at first observed, and whom I immediately recognised as Mr. Samuel Weller and his father.

It was a warm evening, but the elder Mr. Weller was attired, notwithstanding, in a most capacious greatcoat, and his chin enveloped in a large speckled shawl, such as is usually worn by stage coachmen on active service. He looked very rosy and very stout, especially about the legs, which appeared to have been compressed into his top-boots with some difficulty. His broad-brimmed hat he held under his left arm, and with the forefinger of his right hand he touched his forehead a great many times in acknowledgment of my presence.

‘I am very glad to see you in such good health, Mr. Weller,’ said I.

‘Why, thankee, sir,’ returned Mr. Weller, ‘the axle an’t broke yet. We keeps up a steady pace, - not too sewere, but vith a moderate degree o’ friction, - and the consekens is that ve’re still a runnin’ and comes in to the time reg’lar. - My son Samivel, sir, as you may have read on in history,’ added Mr. Weller, introducing his first-born.

I received Sam very graciously, but before he could say a word his father struck in again.

‘Samivel Veller, sir,’ said the old gentleman, ‘has conferred upon me the ancient title o’ grandfather vich had long laid dormouse, and wos s’posed to be nearly hex-tinct in our family. Sammy, relate a anecdote o’ vun o’ them boys, - that ‘ere little anecdote about young Tony sayin’ as he WOULD smoke a pipe unbeknown to his mother.’

‘Be quiet, can’t you?’ said Sam; ‘I never see such a old magpie - never!’

‘That ‘ere Tony is the blessedest boy,’ said Mr. Weller, heedless of this rebuff, ‘the blessedest boy as ever I see in MY days! of all the charmin’est infants as ever I heerd tell on, includin’ them as was kivered over by the robin-redbreasts arter they’d committed sooicide with blackberries, there never wos any like that ‘ere little Tony. He’s alvays a playin’ vith a quart pot, that boy is! To see him a settin’ down on the doorstep pretending to drink out of it, and fetching a long breath artervards, and smoking a bit of firevood, and sayin’, “Now I’m grandfather,” - to see him a doin’ that at two year old is better than any play as wos ever wrote. “Now I’m grandfather!” He wouldn’t take a pint pot if you wos to make him a present on it, but he gets his quart, and then he says, “Now I’m grandfather!”’

Mr. Weller was so overpowered by this picture that he straightway fell into a most alarming fit of coughing, which must certainly have been attended with some fatal result but for the dexterity and promptitude of Sam, who, taking a firm grasp of the shawl just under his father’s chin, shook him to and fro with great violence, at the same time administering some smart blows between his shoulders. By this curious mode of treatment Mr. Weller was finally recovered, but with a very crimson face, and in a state of great exhaustion.

‘He’ll do now, Sam,’ said Mr. Pickwick, who had been in some alarm himself.

‘He’ll do, sir!’ cried Sam, looking reproachfully at his parent. ‘Yes, he WILL do one o’ these days, - he’ll do for his-self and then he’ll wish he hadn’t. Did anybody ever see sich a inconsiderate old file, - laughing into conwulsions afore company, and stamping on the floor as if he’d brought his own carpet vith him and wos under a wager to punch the pattern out in a given time? He’ll begin again in a minute. There - he’s a goin’ off - I said he would!’

In fact, Mr. Weller, whose mind was still running upon his precocious grandson, was seen to shake his head from side to side, while a laugh, working like an earthquake, below the surface, produced various extraordinary appearances in his face, chest, and shoulders, - the more alarming because unaccompanied by any noise whatever. These emotions, however, gradually subsided, and after three or four short relapses he wiped his eyes with the cuff of his coat, and looked about him with tolerable composure.

‘Afore the governor vith-draws,’ said Mr. Weller, ‘there is a pint, respecting vich Sammy has a qvestion to ask. Vile that qvestion is a perwadin’ this here conwersation, p’raps the genl’men vill permit me to re-tire.’

‘Wot are you goin’ away for?’ demanded Sam, seizing his father by the coat-tail.

‘I never see such a undootiful boy as you, Samivel,’ returned Mr. Weller. ‘Didn’t you make a solemn promise, amountin’ almost to a speeches o’ wow, that you’d put that ‘ere qvestion on my account?’

‘Well, I’m agreeable to do it,’ said Sam, ‘but not if you go cuttin’ away like that, as the bull turned round and mildly observed to the drover ven they wos a goadin’ him into the butcher’s door. The fact is, sir,’ said Sam, addressing me, ‘that he wants to know somethin’ respectin’ that ‘ere lady as is housekeeper here.’

‘Ay. What is that?’

‘Vy, sir,’ said Sam, grinning still more, ‘he wishes to know vether she - ‘

‘In short,’ interposed old Mr. Weller decisively, a perspiration breaking out upon his forehead, ‘vether that ‘ere old creetur is or is not a widder.’

Mr. Pickwick laughed heartily, and so did I, as I replied decisively, that ‘my housekeeper was a spinster.’

‘There!’ cried Sam, ‘now you’re satisfied. You hear she’s a spinster.’

‘A wot?’ said his father, with deep scorn.

‘A spinster,’ replied Sam.

Mr. Weller looked very hard at his son for a minute or two, and then said,

‘Never mind vether she makes jokes or not, that’s no matter. Wot I say is, is that ‘ere female a widder, or is she not?’

‘Wot do you mean by her making jokes?’ demanded Sam, quite aghast at the obscurity of his parent’s speech.

‘Never you mind, Samivel,’ returned Mr. Weller gravely; ‘puns may be wery good things or they may be wery bad ‘uns, and a female may be none the better or she may be none the vurse for making